The head of the National Migration Institute (INM) in Ciudad Juarez, Salvador Gonzalez Guerrero, has been detained despite the amparo filed for the death of 40 people after a fire broke out in one of the INM facilities at the end of March, bringing to seven the number of people arrested for these events.
Guerrero’s arrest took place on Sunday afternoon, in spite of the amparo appeal filed on April 13, and one day after four other officials were arrested for homicide and injuries.
By order of the Attorney General’s Office, Eduardo Apodaca Magallanes, head of Material Resources of the INM in Ciudad Juarez; Juan Carlos Meza Cumplido, coordinator of the Migrant Protection Beta Group; and Cecilia Rivera Tena, immigration agent, were arrested on Saturday.
According to the Attorney General’s Office, all of them allegedly failed to comply with their obligations to watch over, protect and provide security to the people who were being held in the facilities they were in charge of.
To date, the bodies of 39 people have been repatriated to their countries of origin, most of them from Central American countries. Images from the center’s security cameras show how several of the victims remained locked up while the flames spread and the officials left the place without rescuing them.
Initially, Mexican President Andrés Manuel López Obrador accused the inmates themselves of starting the fire by setting a mattress on fire as a sign of protest against their situation, as they had been notified of the authorities’ intentions to return them to their countries of origin.
Source: (EUROPA PRESS)
